chapter Seven 



ATOMIC HYDROGEN AS AN AID TO 

 INDUSTRIAL RESEARCH 



I BELIEVE the primary object of the Perkin Medal is to do honor to the 

 memory of Sir WilHam Perkin, that pioneer who devoted himself to pure 

 scientific research after having led in the industrial applications of research 

 for fifteen years. This object is best attained by encouraging the kind of 

 research that he valued so highly. The medal should thus be regarded, not 

 as a reward for accomplishment nor as a prize to stimulate competition in 

 research, but rather as a means of directing attention to the value of re- 

 search and to the methods of research that are most productive. Having 

 this in mind, I am going to tell you, although somewhat reluctantly, the 

 history of some of my own work, in so far as it illustrates a method of 

 industrial research that has proved valuable. 



TWO TYPES OF INDUSTRIAL RESEARCH 



The leaders of industries are frequently conscious of the need of im- 

 provement in their processes, and even of the need of new discoveries or 

 inventions which will extend their activities. It is thus logical, and often 

 extremely profitable, to organize research laboratories to solve specific 

 problems. Efficiency requires that the director shall assign to each worker 

 a carefully planned program. Experiments which do not logically fit in with 

 this program are to be discouraged. This type of industrial research, which 

 should often be called engineering rather than research, has frequently 

 been very successful in solving specific problems, but usually along lines 

 already foreseen. 



This method, however, has serious limitations. Directors are rare who 

 can foresee the solutions sufficiently well to plan out a good campaign of 

 attack in advance. Then, too, the best type of research man does not like to 

 be told too definitely what must be the objects of his experiments. To him 

 scientific curiosity is usually a greater incentive than the hope of com- 

 mercially useful results. Fortunately, however, with proper encouragement, 

 this curiosity itself is a guide that may lead to fundamental discoveries, 

 and thus may solve the specific problems in still better ways than could 



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